# kaal:claim:3782210-041

**Claim.** Without the promise of improving reputation, a zero-sum mentality dominates a contractual arrangement and each party's best strategy becomes exerting the absolute minimum effort while still technically fulfilling the contract, which destroys the business atmosphere.

**Type.** failure  **Support.** argued

**Holds when.**

- contracts between parties with no expectation of reputational gain

**Source quote.**

> With- out the promise of improving your reputation, a zero-sum mentality dominates the arrangement. Both parties' best strategy becomes exerting the absolute minimum of effort while still technically fulfilling the stipulations of the contract.

**From.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, *The Importance of Reputation for the Evolution of Decentralization* (2021), Summary, page 15

**Cite as.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, The Importance of Reputation for the Evolution of Decentralization (2021). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3782210

**Verify.** sha256 of source PDF `9cc531ab239f6266c8aeddcc8e54f4c06029c44e825444bee137bbcc0c9d0a8e` at https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wulfkaal/Academic-Papers/main/papers/pdf/Calcaterra%20and%20Kaal%20-%202021%20-%20The%20Importance%20of%20Reputation%20for%20the%20Evolution%20of%20Decentralization.pdf

**Failure mode.** Minimum compliance degeneration  (family: agency-cost-and-managerial-opportunism)

**Topics.** risk-and-incentives

**Keywords.** zero-sum, minimum-effort, contract-performance, incentives

**Canonical form.** This markdown file is the canonical hashed representation of the claim. Its sha256 is the content hash used for attestation.